Have You Been Impacted By The Equifax Breach?

In this day and age where most everything rests on your credit score it is imperative that you constantly monitor your credit. It weighs even heavier for single parents.

Equifax is currently under fire for it's data breach.

I want everyone to be as safe as possible.

Here are some really easy steps to see if you have been impacted by this breach. (Sidenote: Please don't come for my battery life! It's charging!)

First, you'll want to type in the website highlighted down below:

You'll come to a page that looks like this. Mind you I'm on the mobile site, so the layout may be a little different if you do this from your desktop.

You'll want to scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the link that reads "Potential Impact" as shown below.

Once you've clicked on "Potential Impact" you'll want to scroll to the bottom of the next page where you'll see a link titled "Check Potential Impact"

The next page will prompt you to enter your last name and the last 6 digits of your social security number.

The next page will reveal whether you've been impacted by the breach. In my case my personal information was compromised by the breach.

So why did I say "NO!" to enrolling?

Well, it's believed that it would opt you out of the class action lawsuit against Equifax. Whether this is true or not I personally do not trust the protection of someone who was just recently hacked. There are other methods of protecting your identity.

In the meantime keep your eyes and ears open about further developments regarding this matter.

UPDATE... Where have I been? What's been going on?:

So these past few weeks. Month really... I've been dealing with a looming custody case set for mid April. It's been the cause of me not being very active and was (still is) the source of my anger and frustration that I've been experiencing as of late.
While preparing for my court date I began to realize that mothers (which there are many) who are in the position of being manipulated in this way by their children's fathers are really without many physical resources. I learned this quickly when reaching out to different orgs. They only deal with cases where children are in immediate danger.
While I received a lot of reassurance that I have nothing to worry about in terms of losing sole custody it's no lie that it can be really scary for a mother with absolutely no experience in this area and who knows she's done no wrong....
A few great things happened to me in these past couple weeks. I am able to go back to school and I just accepted a great new job.
This motivated me to channel my frustration and anger surrounding this custody case into something positive.
I want to ultimately set up a community based resource center for mothers who are subjected to this type of manipulation. I want to empower women to be vocal and unapologetic about demanding what's needed for their children. And have the necessary tools to stand firm in this decision and to legally take on any retaliation initiated by the other party.
I'm still trying to figure what needs to be done to accomplish this goal, but I'm so dedicated to making this happen!